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I have some bourbon, and while it’s not really my drink of choice, none of them are. I drink, even been known to get drunk, but after how my father drove Mom out and systematically ruined his life and mine with liquor, it’s not really on the top of my grocery list.
Sure, I bought tequila for Nadia, and if I had a favorite, it’d be that, but . . .
Right now, I want to lose myself in the bottom of the bottle in my bag.
I won’t, I almost never do.
Pocketing my phone, I grab my jacket when someone knocks on the door.
I grab my gun and open it.
“Nadia? Why are you here and how the hell did you find me?”
Her hair’s still in the braid. It’s now messy, and she changed into pajamas with lambs on them. This time she’s donned a heavy pair of boots that make her look for all the world like the world’s most adorable punk.
She’s gorgeous.
But those green eyes aren’t soft. They’re hard, glittering, and fighting mad.
“You’ve been a lot of things to me over the years, Diego,” she says, poking me in the chest. “But I never thought you’d be a coward. And of course, I found you. Enders Hotel? Room twelve? You used to always come here, and this is the room tucked furthest away.”
“And you left Jay?”
She pushes up against me, and pulls the door shut then springs away like I’m diseased. That or she’s really fucking mad. My money’s on the latter.
“No, I didn’t leave him. Not alone.” Nadia crosses her arms, still steaming mad. “Your big friends turned up, Nicolo and Tizio. Says they’ve been on the road for a while. Hadn’t heard from you? I said hopefully you were in a ditch somewhere . . . not dead but painfully maimed. And they’re watching the house and Jay.”
Of course, they were in town when I called.
“So, they’re there, and I’m here because you kissed me and ran off. You’re a coward, Diego. An honest to God coward.”
I rub the back of my neck. “There’s that.”
Thing is she’s right, in all of it. Resisting her is a futile, uphill battle of the kind I can’t win.
“This can never work, Longstocking.”
“I know.”
“We’re too different.”
She presses her lips together then blows out a breath. “No. You’re too much of a stubborn coward.”
I stare at her, all that fire and spark and life. The way her cheeks are pink, and her long, dark hair is askew, and she didn’t notice or care. The change in her pajamas the only sign those fucks got to her.
She’s a hell of a woman, and she’s laying into me like I’m a kid.
There are grown men who wouldn’t dare.
I want her.
It’s as simple and devastating as that.
I want her.
Does it even matter this might not work, that the lies and betrayals of the past are still there, unchecked? Because I think if there’s even a slight chance, I’ll go for it. Fuck. I’ll go for it even if there isn’t. Even if it’s just another taste, a few stolen hours with her.
“And I don’t think I can deal with a coward right now.”
